


Suiting Up

by Anjali_Organna



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: F/M, Halloween, Meaningless Fluff, fun with dress up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-06-02
Packaged: 2018-04-02 13:07:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4061131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anjali_Organna/pseuds/Anjali_Organna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>College is the first time in years that they don’t spend Halloween together. Barry doesn’t do anything, but Iris texts him a photo of her and several girls from her dorm dressed up together as cats.</p><p>“Really?” Barry texts back. “Cats?”</p><p>“Wasn’t my idea,” she replies. “And you're not here to give us any better ideas.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Suiting Up

**Author's Note:**

> So someone on tumblr asked @glamaphonic what [Barry and Iris would dress up as for Halloween](http://glamaphonic.tumblr.com/post/120272653659/when-barry-iris-do-couple-costumes-for), and I got inspired, and then I got carried away. My bad.

Later, Barry will try to claim credit, but Iris insists that it’s all due to his mom. “You didn’t even _want_ to be Ernie,” she says, laughing, and Barry won’t tell her that he’d been slightly embarrassed that she was only Bert because she was taller. They were seven, or possibly eight, and that was the year the tradition had begun. 

The following year they’d intended to go as Jasmine and Aladdin from the Disney movie, but a freak early snowstorm (“It’s _October!”_ Joe had bellowed disbelievingly) forced them to rethink their plans. In the end, Barry wore Prince Ali’s turban instead of a hat and Iris piled on several pairs of long underwear under her Jasmine pants and they called it a day. Fortunately most other kids in the neighborhood were in the same boat and no one blinked at the odd assemblage of outfits. 

*

The Halloween after Barry’s mom dies, they don’t go out. Barry is still in his furious-at-everything mode, and Joe knows better than to suggest anything as light-hearted as dressing up. Instead, they stay in and watch scary movies and Joe pretends not to notice when Iris filtches candy meant for the trick-or-treaters. 

*

Iris is usually up for whatever Barry suggests, finding his ideas generally amusing. Some of them work better than others--for instance, the water molecule had been good in theory, but they’d spent all night having to explain to people what they were and being literally attached to one another got old quickly. He’s particularly proud of their Wall-e and EVE costumes, which makes everyone they meet smile in delight, and the Where’s Waldo and Carmen Santiago outfits inspire a lot of admiration, if he’s gonna be totally unhumble about it. He’s not as wild about going as Harry Potter the following year, but she’s so pleased to be Hermione that he finds the costumes worth it. 

Senior year, Barry doesn’t entirely think through his idea before broaching it with Iris. “Well,” she says slowly, “if you’re Luke, I guess that makes me Leia?”

Barry emphatically does _not_ want to be the Luke to her Leia. She doesn’t comment when he tells her he’s decided to be Han instead. “I’m not wearing the gold bikini,” she says only, and Barry’s brain stutters to a stop imagining _that._ “You’re gonna have to do the cinnamon roll buns,” he says weakly after a minute, and she gives a martyred sigh. 

(“You’re so tall now, Bear, maybe you should be Chewbacca,” Joe jokes, and then pretends not to notice when Barry gives him a death glare.)

*

College is the first time in years that they don’t spend Halloween together. Barry doesn’t do anything, but Iris texts him a photo of her and several girls from her dorm dressed up together as cats.

“Really?” Barry texts back. “Cats?”

“Wasn’t my idea,” she replies. “And you're not here to give us any better ideas.”

She doesn’t text him the following year and he assumes that she hadn’t gone out. He doesn’t think anything of it until the following morning, when he sees the photos someone’s tagged of her on Facebook.

She’s a mermaid. The costume is...revealing. Barry stares, mouth dry, and then immediately takes a shower where he takes himself in hand and comes pretty much instantly, picturing that smooth expanse of exposed skin. (He stopped feeling guilty about touching himself to thoughts of her years ago; he would have been paralyzed with it otherwise. She’s _Iris._ There are days when she _breathes_ a certain way and he gets hard.)

He calls her later that day, wanting to hear the tone of her voice. “Have fun last night?”

Her answer is immediate and sheepish. “Oh, god. That was definitely _not_ my idea. I froze my ass off.”

“Yeah, looked like it,” he says carefully. 

“Don’t you dare tell my dad. He’d have a heart attack.”

“Trust me,” Barry says with perfect honesty. “The last thing I want to do is tell Joe about your costume.”

She laughs and he relaxes a bit. “Honestly, Bear, Halloween with you was always so much more fun.”

“I miss you too, Iris.”

*

She times her visit to him the next year to fall over Halloween, bringing with her a set of costumes that she’d refused to tell him about in advance. “Trust me, you’ll love it,” was all she’d say in response to his badgering. 

When Iris pulls out the costumes, his face lights up in surprise and pleasure. “That’s actually a genius idea.”

She rolls her eyes. “Oh, _‘actually,’_ ” she quotes. “Gosh, thanks Barry.”

“I’m not shaving my eyebrows though.”

She looks at him critically and he squirms under her perusal. “Maybe we can draw them on?”

The eyebrows end up looking ridiculous, but the thing is, Iris is so distractingly hot in her Uhura costume that no one notices anyways. 

*

“You _cannot_ go as the Flash,” Iris says, exasperated. 

Barry grins at her. “Not me, you.”

She blinks at him. “Oh.” Then comes the start of a smile, curling one corner of her lips. “Huh.”

“I asked Cisco to make something for you. As a surprise. Obviously we couldn’t be too exact with the costume--don’t want people to wonder just how close you’ve gotten to the Flash.”

The smile’s more of a smirk now. She steps closer to him, trailing a finger up his chest. “No, we definitely wouldn’t want that.”

Barry laughs down at her even as he lets her crowd him against the wall. “Don’t you want to see what Cisco came up with?”

“Mmm,” Iris says, gripping the back of his neck and one shoulder and tugging herself up against him. “Maybe later.” He obliges, catching her up and spinning around so she’s the one pinned between him and the wall. 

“But Cisco worked so hard,” he breathes against her neck, still smiling, and is rewarded with a pinch to his side.

“Cisco can wait,” Iris says, and then she’s kissing him and he forgets all about Halloween.

*

Iris’s Flash suit is _awesome_. Barry is considerably less awesome, but that’s kind of the point--he’d found a second-hand parka at a Salvation Army and a cheap pair ski goggles and he’s got a stupid-looking water gun that he shoots her with. Cisco laughs when he sees them and then pales. “Wait, do you think Captain Cold will get pissed when he sees that you went as him?”

“Captain Cold is a douche,” Barry says. “And also, it’s not my fault he’s got a lame-ass costume.”

“Try telling him that to his face,” Caitlin mutters, but she apparently doesn’t believe in Halloween, like at _all_ , so Barry ignores her for the time being.

Eventually Cisco unbends enough to take several photos of Iris pretending to beat Barry up, after extracting a promise from both Barry and Iris that they will refrain from posting said photos anywhere Snart might find them. 

“You really outdid yourself on this one, Cisco,” Iris says, craning around to see the back of the suit. 

“Thanks,” Cisco replies. “You know, I kind of want to see what it would look like if I hewed closer to the design of Barry’s actual suit.”

Iris shrugs. “I mean, if you want to.”

“He definitely wants to,” Barry says, admiring the fit of the material over Iris’s ass. “But first we have to go home.”

“Wha--” Iris begins before he zips her out of there. He stops in their kitchen, setting her on the counter. Iris looks amused. “We’re supposed to be going to a party, you know.”

“Sorry,” Barry says, not very sorry at all. “But I just remembered what you said a long time ago, about the suit being a turn-on.”

“Oh, really?” Iris is fully grinning now. She leans back on the counter and spreads legs encased in red leather.

Barry drops the parka on the floor and steps in between her knees. “Yeah,” he says. “Now I finally understand the feeling.”

(They don’t make it to the party.)

*

Three days after the first sonogram, Barry surprises Iris at work. His eyes are alight with a feverish delight that immediately puts her on her guard. “What happened?” she asks suspiciously. “What did you do?”

“I just had the greatest realization ever,” Barry says, sitting on the corner of her desk, heedless of the files and folders heaped everywhere. “Twins. Do you know what this means?”

“We need to start saving immediately for college?”

“No,” he says. “Well, yes, but that’s not what--Halloween, Iris! There are _two_ of them. We are going to have the greatest Halloween costumes ever. Just think of all the amazing things we can do to them.”

“Oh my god,” Iris says, shoving him off her desk. “I’m _working._ Go away.”

“But Iris--”

“And they will be your _children,_ Barry, not some dolls you can just dress up at whim. We will have to respect their wishes for what they want to be.”

“But Iris…”

She stands, rising up on her toes to kiss his chin. “Well, I guess we’ll have at least a couple years where they won’t be able to fight back.”

He laughs and picks her up, spins her around. “And that’s why I love you.”

“Seriously, I have a deadline. Go bother Cisco with your costume ideas.”

Barry laughs again and gives her a quick kiss before bolting towards the door. “He’s already on it.”

“Of course he is,” Iris mutters to his back, before sitting back down at her desk.

**


End file.
